The oil and gas industry employs numerous professionals across a wide variety of academic disciplines. For instance, a single corporation may employ geologists, geophysicists, petroleum engineers, drilling engineers, and drilling rig personnel, among many others. Because these professionals frequently collaborate with each other on various projects, the capability to share information with each other is essential, and the ability to seamlessly collect, process, and distribute relevant information in real-time across all of these disciplines would be particularly advantageous. Current technology, however, is limited in this regard.
For example, the simple act of reporting a potential safety concern on an oil rig can require a rig hand to document the problem (e.g., by taking a photograph), collect information pertaining to the problem (e.g., by accessing company safety procedures), identify relevant safety personnel to whom the problem must be reported, and compose and send an e-mail containing relevant documentation and information. Although the problem is urgent, the safety personnel may not read the incoming e-mail immediately, and taking action to correct the problem and to ensure the safety of all employees on the rig is often an inefficient, tedious process. Accordingly, a technology that removes these and other inefficiencies by facilitating the seamless, real-time sharing of relevant information across an organization is desired.
It should be understood, however, that the specific embodiments given in the drawings and detailed description thereto do not limit the disclosure. On the contrary, they provide the foundation for one of ordinary skill to discern the alternative forms, equivalents, and modifications that are encompassed together with one or more of the given embodiments in the scope of the appended claims.